tomorrow
by Cath1
Summary: You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your life will change irrevocably. H/R. Now updated. Spoilers from final episode.
1. Chapter 1

tomorrow

Disclaimer: How different things would be if they were mine. But they're not.

Summary: You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your life will change irrevocably. H/R

Notes: V much tired but wanted to write something. And this is what happened.

Enjoy! And, if you have the time, reviews make my day.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow is when it all begins.

You will enter the Grid, walk into the meeting room, and you'll be clumsy and awkward and Harry Pearce will crack that awful joke. But somehow, at the end of it all, you will feel a sense of achievement; you'll finally start to feel a sense of belonging. You won't know even then that this will be the start of so many things: that Tom and Zoe and Danny will each leave in their various ways and each will deeply affect you; that one day you'll realise that you're in love with Harry Pearce and you'll not know what to do with this knowledge; that your life will end and then start and then end and then start in an almost repetitive circle.

But now, you nervously prepare for this new beginning, studying bus and tube routes, checking your alarm again, making sure the outfit you've decided on is ironed, before finally settling into bed and trying, unsuccessfully, to sleep.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow is when it all begins. And you're anxious for the day to start.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow will be the beginning of a realisation.

You'll hear the news about Harry being shot and your heart will feel as though it's stopped momentarily. And you'll successfully convince yourself that it's because you're worried about Harry as a colleague, a friend, and that the others will feel equally as anxious and stricken. And you'll not realise that this is just the beginning. The beginning of burying feelings so deep within yourself that for the longest time you won't even realise what they mean. And then, when you do eventually realise, and denial is no longer a feasible option, the beginning of hiding these feelings from others, and from him.

But now, thoughts of anything that isn't work-related are too far from your mind as events begin to unravel that surely will bring about the end of Tom's career.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow will be the beginning of a realisation. But now, you can't begin to think about anything but the present.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your life will change irrevocably.

You will begin the day so normally, and yet a simple request to exchange a ten pound note will set the wheels in motion for an event that will change the course of your life. A course of events that will have you heading away from all that you know, to cut the ties with a kiss and such a sense of finality that will lead you into a numb and empty existence for weeks to come.

But now you sit in your living room, cat upon your lap purring gently as you watch the television without watching. Your mind takes you to other places, as it does so frequently, to question whether you are satisfied with this lonely life, and whether you might finally try again to take small steps towards letting him in. Because you're beginning to realise that happiness might be more important than worrying about what others think when the alternative is a life of loneliness.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your life will change irrevocably. And you sit and consider a different future.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you will begin to consider a future without Harry.

You will meet George while you're sat in the canteen eating lunch alone. He'll ask if he can sit next to you because he's seen you around and has wanted to talk to you for a while. He'll be nice and kind and interesting and intelligent and attractive, and it will all help you start to break down the walls you've constructed around yourself and let him in. And afterwards, you'll smile and think how much you enjoyed the conversation. And then, a moment later, you'll feel vaguely guilty and melancholic, because he's not Harry and he never can be Harry and you find it hard to move on. But somehow, you'll push these thoughts aside and make a decision to no longer dwell on what is in the past and cannot be anything more.

But now, you shop alone, pushing a trolley through an unfamiliar supermarket in an unfamiliar world, passing unfamiliar people and you wonder if you've made the right decision to try and settle somewhere when it feels like nowhere can be home.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you will begin to consider a future without Harry. But currently, that seems so far away.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your world will be thrown upside down.

You will have such a mundane, ordinary day, followed by the beginnings of a mundane, ordinary evening. And then, everything will change. And it will lead you to this horrific place where you know only pain and fear and there will be _him_, and it will all be a confusing mess of grief and agony and shock.

But now, you sit by the pool drinking wine with George in the warmth of the Cyprus evening. And it is enjoyable in its simplicity. And then, the whisper of a thought of Harry crosses your mind for the first time in a long time and you quickly push it aside; it has no place in this life. You take a sip of the wine, look over to George, and smile, because life is about now, and the now is good and you're glad to be here.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow your world will be thrown upside down. And you're happily oblivious.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll agree to go back to MI5.

Even as you agree, you'll not be sure why, except that you've got nowhere else to be, and Jo wants you back, and even though it's not a real reason, it's better than nothing. And this decision will take you back to that life, of long hours and terrible acts of inhumanity and cold loneliness and him. It will take you back to a place where people can be taken from you in the blink of an eye or the shot of a gun.

But now, you sit alone in an impersonal cafe, thinking about George and Nico and how much you miss them both. You think of Jo and Harry and your conversations with them, the only things tethering you to this life. And you wonder what tomorrow will bring.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll agree to go back to MI5. And as you sit alone, you feel nothing but guilt that your old life was what destroyed this one.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow will be the catalyst for change.

You'll lose Ros. And it will be almost unbearably painful to lose yet another colleague, a friend, in such a short space of time. But the shared pain will bring those of you who are left closer together. Lucas, struggling with his own pain and injuries, will produce a bottle of vodka when he returns to the Grid later that evening, and you will gladly accept a glass, then another, then another. You'll drink in silence until Lucas breaks the quiet and starts talking, about Ros, about unrelated topics, his tongue loosened by the alcohol. And you'll share some of your own stories. And then Harry will enter, tie half undone and askew, tired and broken by the day. You'll take him a drink, hand briefly placed on his arm, and in that moment where his tired eyes meet yours, you'll make a decision that something good will have to come from all this pain.

But now, you are at your desk, working despite the late hour, trying to figure out connections to Nightingale and related threats and who can be trusted. And somehow you're glad not to be alone at your flat even when the alternative is being at work with colleagues who, despite months spent working together, on the whole, you're still not that close to.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow will be the catalyst for change. And in some ways, maybe that's a good thing.

XxX

You already know that tomorrow will change your life.

You've already made a decision. You will tell Harry how you feel. Or at least, tell him that you want your tenuous relationship to develop into something more tangible. Because with everything that has happened in the past few years and the past few weeks, you know that you'll regret not giving it a chance more than you'll regret things going wrong. Because life is finite, and you are acutely aware of this fact, and damnit, you deserve to be happy. You both deserve to be happy.

You already know that tomorrow will change your life.

And then, you reconsider.

You pick up the phone, call him, and invite him over.

Because you don't want to wait until tomorrow.

XxX

Fini


	2. Chapter 2

Because now Spooks has ended, I re-read this fic and decided I wanted to bring it full circle. Reviews still make my day.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll find out the truth about Lucas.

You'll realise that one of the few people in your life you thought you could trust isn't actually the person you thought they were at all. And it'll all start a spiral of events that ends in Lucas drugging you and Harry risking his future and his career to save your life and Lucas ending his. And for a while, you'll think that Harry is dead, and you'll have no idea how to move on from this. And then he'll return and for a moment, you'll consider telling him the truth: that there's nothing more important in your life than him. But somehow, it doesn't happen.

But now, you're sat in the grid late at night after almost everyone has gone home, because somehow this all doesn't add up, and you're not willing to accept that, even if your suspicions are starting to point in the direction of friends. But then, you look at the time on your computer with surprise, and realise that maybe being home with Beth is better than being at work alone at 9pm at night.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll find out the truth about Lucas. And then everything changes.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow Tariq will die.

You'll find out late at night because Harry calls you at home and tells you to come to the grid. And you'll be in a heightened state of awareness, a fear that something terrible has happened, which is only reinforced by the police presence and the tone which Harry uses. And by the time that he tells you, you won't be surprised, because you'd already pieced this together and you've heard this before, just with different names. And as you try not to cry, Harry places his hand on your shoulder briefly, and for two seconds you'll almost feel comforted. But there are others there, and in the end, you just feel numb. You answer the questions asked, and then that's over and there's just this space in your life where Tariq and all the others once were. And you're almost a pro at pretending to move past that now.

But now, you grin at Tariq, the one piece of comic relief in your life, as he mutters amusing retorts to Callum's self-assured comments, and you think of how glad you are to have at least one friend in your life.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow Tariq will die. And you think that finally you're all starting to heal from the wounds left by Lucas.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll find out more about Harry's past.

And you'll hurt, not only because Harry's been pushing you away, but because Sasha is yet one more thing between you that you can't share and that he won't share. And you'll realise that this thing with Elena is maybe not something he'll get past quite as quick as you'd thought.

But now you sit in a meeting with him and wonder how someone sitting right beside you can be so distant.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll find out more about Harry's past. But now, you don't think you'd be surprised by anything.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll agree to take the job with the Home Secretary.

And finally, you'll feel a slight relief that maybe the whole cycle of you and Harry and the life at MI-5 is over even as you feel the pain of it ending. Because Harry's been so distant lately and you're so damn confused about what you want and what he wants. And then, later, the thought will appear in your head that maybe, after Elena and Sasha go back to Russia, and this is all over, maybe this might be your chance. Because, lately, you've been starting to think that there's more to life than being stuck in this cycle where you're near to him physically, but no longer as close as you were.

But now, you sit next to him in a park as he tells you that you need to leave, and your heart starts to break just a little and you hate that he's made you so weak that even with everything that has gone on, you still need him to need you.

You don't know it yet, but tomorrow you'll agree to take the job with the Home Secretary. And you can't think of anything worse than leaving him.

XxX

You don't know it yet, but soon it will be the end.

You'll be so close to the future you've secretly dreamed about for so long. This thing that you and Harry have been denying for so long will be finally almost tangible and real and within your grasp. And then, because of a moment where you decided that a certain action was necessary to save the lives of others, it's all over. The people you saved will be blissfully unaware of your actions, of how close they came to their own ending, Sasha will die, and Harry will oversee the whole scene, helpless.

But now, you sit in your waiting room flat, trying to contain your excitement for the first time in years as you look at home design magazines and plan what to do in your new house. And you sit back with a glass of wine and imagine how it will look, and you can't help but picture Harry in this new life. And it makes you smile. And for the first time in so, so long, you start to look forward to the future.

You don't know it yet, but soon it will be the end. But now, you sit and plan your future, and for once, you begin to think that maybe it'll all turn out okay.

XxX

End


End file.
